Bands

New Instruments

Nikita is bored of mixing drinks. She might have the Shy trait, but that doesn't mean she hates people. Plus, with saint's career not advancing as fast as they were planning on due to his long time in achieving celebrity status, she remians bored at home.

Using some of their spare money, Nikita buys a custom bass guitar to take advantage of the new music skills. Starting with the Late Night expansion, your Sims can learn skills in bass guitars, pianos, and drums, in addition to the base game's normal guitar skill! Each of those items are available through Buy Mode and, strangely enough, are all portable. It makes sense; if a Sim can shove a pickup truck in their pockets, an entire drum set shouldn't be trouble either.

Pianos and drums do take a lot of room once they're placed in the environment, more room than they can afford to have in their little Bridgeport apartment. She could practice outside of course, but that's awfully inconvenient, especially given the fact that she'd have to ride the elevator down each time. So that leaves normal guitars or bass guitars, and she figures the bassists are a little bit more out of the spotlight.

With the bass in her personal inventory, we interact with it to practice. She pulls it out of her pockets, finds the closest spot to practice, and begins. Like with drums and pianos, canceling the command will cause her to just pocket the instrument again.

If the instrument is already placed in the environment, Sims will just leave it there after they're done playing. They only pocket it if it was in their personal inventory to begin with.

Starting a Band

Nikita quickly achieves level 1 in her bass skill. Playing alone isn't very fun though, and now that she's had a taste of the night life, she wants more! The perfect solution is to be in a band. You can't ever join one, but that's no big deal: Nikita decides to start one!

She heads over to the Sports Zone and finds Buster Round waiting in the lobby to take the elevator up. She quickly uses her seldom-used Charisma skills to start a conversation, then quickly uses the "Friendly... | Ask To Form Band" social interaction. Despite them just meeting for the first time, Buster accepts, and Nikita is asked for the band name! "Woo Hoo Warriors" is the first name given, so... why not?

Band can have up to four Sims, but can get along with two. It's always easier if all the bandmates are under your control, but as you're about to see, it's not required.

Now, Buster doesn't have any music skills, but that doesn't matter: you can ask anyone to join a band regardless of their skills so long as they're not already in one. When it comes time to perform, Sims choose their instruments based on what they're best at, but if they're not good at anything, they'll randomly pick one of the instruments and naturally get better at it.

Nikita invites Buster into a group, then heads up with him to the Sports Zone. There, in front of her bar, is a stage with instruments already placed. Nikita takes up the bass with a "Start Jam" command, then uses the "Ask To Join Jam" remote social interaction on Buster, who comes over and grabs the lead guitar. With enough practice, he'll be good enough at the guitar that he'll automatically take it up for future performances.

Jamming like this does lead to skill gains, and the band automatically sets out tip jars. Nikita could invite Buster over to their apartment so he can conitnue practicing with her privately, or they can continue to meet up in town. It's slow going at first, and it's always easier to form bands among multiple members of the same active household, but it's possible to work with townies like this.

Performing Gigs

Once Nikita is done messing around in Sports Zone, she heads over to the city hall and registers as a self-employed band member. Without doing that, she's just a Sim with a dream and the ability to make terrible noises by plucking strings.

Nikita continues to live life as normal, but just aren't any calls coming in for any real performances. The thing is, no one knows who Nikita is; she's got the same problem Saint had with his film career. So, she deicdes to use the same solution. She makes Saint call Odine over to the apartment, then Nikita impresses her to become a 1-star celebrity.

To be in a band however, it takes a lot more exposure than simple celebrity levels, and that's one thing the game doesn't tell you. You receive gigs as a band through phone calls, but the opportunities specifically attached to your band arenotrandom. Each band opportunity has a specific order in which it's received, and there seem to be invisible requirements in order to trigger them. In general, you need to work with your band in public to get noticed.

Nikita heads over to the nearest park, then accesses her cell phone. Because she's in a band, she gets a special commanded called "Invite Band Members." With one phone call, all band members (just Buster in this case) will be alerted. The best part is that the bandmates will drop anything they're doing to join you, including their own conventional jobs. This way, your band wouldn't have to juggle up to four different work schedules, which might be close to impossible.

Once everyone is here, Nikita uses a specific command with her bass: "Start a Jam Session," just like she did at Sports Zone. It must be that command: playing for tips, performing, and "Play Alone" don't work. Once Nikita starts jamming, she interacts with Buster and, again just like at the Sports Zone, invites him to join her. If he doesn't have an instrument, he'll spawn one in his inventory and start playing along. As you can see to the right, Buster created a bass out of nothingness.

Performing jam sessions automatically makes them put out tip jars. We had some bad luck, as there aren't many people here, but the important thing isn't profits: it's getting the band to practice together. Doing this will get the band noticed by the unseen forces that control your band's destiny.

At the end of the day, as they start to finish their session, Nikita gets a phone call. Reading over the opportunity, we see it's tailored specifically to the band; the Woo Hoo Warriors' name is in the opportunity description. Nikita accepts it, then attends the rock concert as instructed.

Gigs will eventually come the same way, instructing the band to visit a specific venue at a specific time and play. Even outside of official gigs, the band can always get together for a jam session and earn tips, especially at clubs. The audience is more free with their money when you're good, so keep practicing and work on your celebrity level to keep the money rolling in.

Note: There is a bug associated with starting bands in which your band members will not receive gigs nor any opportunities associated with the band. If playing for tips is absolutley not working, and the agents are refusing to call, your save file may simply be unable to have bands. As of April 19, 2012 (game version 12.0.273), there is still no official workaround.